


Death Takes a Holiday

by MrsHamill



Series: Sandman Crossover Project [3]
Category: The Sandman (Comics)
Genre: Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Multiple Crossovers, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-20 21:48:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6026431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrsHamill/pseuds/MrsHamill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blair meets Death; both are charmed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death Takes a Holiday

**Author's Note:**

> Crossover with _The Sentinel_.

* * *

Then there was this girl, right? And she was... God, she was pretty. No. Beautiful. She was beautiful and _tiny_ , so small -- the word 'gamine' came to him, and he remembered someone saying that Audrey Hepburn was gamine, but this girl, whoa, this girl made Hepburn look like Kathy Bates. Did he mention small? He wasn't much into small girls, though he wasn't exactly Mr. Height himself, especially around giants like Jim and Simon. He still preferred tall girls, with legs up to _here_ , and she just wasn't. But he found it didn't matter, not with her.

Really beautiful, with this mass of dark hair on her head, wearing black jeans and a black tank. "I love your ankh," he said, and she smiled, and it was like the sun coming out, honest. Just like that.

"Thanks!" 

Her voice was almost but not quite ordinary. And her eyes, well, their strangeness just made her face more beautiful. And the eyeliner she had on... "Cool symbol under your eye there, it matches the ankh, doesn't it? Egyptian, I think, right?"

"Of course," she replied still smiling. She slid her hands into her back pockets.

"I love Egyptian symbolism, and it really goes with the look you've got going here, very neo-punkish and man, you're gorgeous." Whoops, he hadn't meant to say that aloud, but maybe she'd take it the right way.

She did. "Thank you. You're not so hard on the eyes either, you know." 

He rolled his eyes -- he knew what he looked like. A lot of women got off on his looks, called him _exotic_ , loved his mouth and his wiry build. But he knew what he looked like, and his overbite had always bothered him. Though he knew his eyes were good, at least when he wore contacts. 

He glanced down at himself and wasn't surprised to find he was soaked through, his long, wet hair dripping on his sodden jacket. "Not at the moment, I don't think," he said with a wry smile.

"Well, that fountain wasn't exactly the cleanest thing in the world," she said, obviously commiserating with him.

"Bird shit tastes _awful_ ," he agreed. "If I live to a hundred, I'm never going to forget..."

He trailed off. Something was impinging on his consciousness, something that had just happened. With a start, he realized what it was. "Alex!"

"Relax, she's not here." The girl's eyes were sympathetic. "She really did a number on you, though."

"God... I can't believe what she said..." He had been so excited to find another Sentinel, another proof to his belief that the type wasn't extinct, could, in fact, be alive even in these modern times. "She was so different from Jim, you know? Amoral. I think I let myself be blinded, though," he continued, sadly. "I wanted another one. I never, not for a moment, let myself think that a Sentinel could be anything other than good, like Jim. Like Jim." He felt a sob work its way up his throat and ruthlessly suppressed it.

"He was out of his head, you know," she said. Her voice was soft and gentle, but her eyes were shrewd. "He really does love you, he's just been..." she shrugged.

"Hurt." He nodded. "Everyone that he's ever loved has betrayed him, in one way or another. He closed himself off."

"It's a rather standard tactic with humans, you know."

She said it as if she were not human, as if she were only observing humans. It was the way he felt sometimes, too, when he was deep into observing mode. "I know, I know that." He let his chin drop onto his wet chest and began pacing back and forth in front of her, gesturing with his hands. "And with Jim, it's even worse, you know. He has all these imperatives, what he feels are his duties, they're chasing themselves inside him all the time. He's very much like the big jungle cat, that's his spirit guide, you know, a black jaguar, and he lashes out when he's hurt. Doesn't matter what kind of pain it is, emotional or physical; he lashes out anyway."

"I know what his spirit guide is." She was standing preternaturally still, only following his pacing with her eyes. "I know what yours is, too."

He went to take a breath and couldn't. He stopped, clutched at his throat, trying to breathe. His lungs were full of water, and he could remember the last thing Alex had said to him, said as she pushed him face first into the fountain. "If I can't have you..." The words drifted off as he clawed for air.

In shock, he looked up again. He knew his eyes were wide and staring as he realized where he was, who she must be. "You..." he gasped.

"Y'see," she said, only her head moving as she cocked it to one side, "you've got a spirit animal. It means a lot of things, but in this case, it means I have more work than I would normally have."

"I'm... I'm..."

"Not yet, no. Normally, yes." She followed him down as he sank to his knees in the cold, cold grass, but she didn't touch him. "Normally, this is where you'd find out what lies beyond." She sat and pulled her knees up, wrapped her arms around them. Her gaze never once left his face.

_What lies beyond_... the words burned like fire in his brain and he whimpered, his hands still clawing at his throat, trying to get a breath. His heart should have been hammering in his chest, but it wasn't. It wasn't. 

"You have two paths ahead of you. Your spirit animal is a timber wolf, and they don't give up easily. Can you hear him?"

And suddenly, he could. Far in the lost distance, he heard the mournful howl of a wolf who had lost his mate. "What...?" He gasped the word, terrified of what was to happen. Might happen. Had happened. Choose one, any one.

"You can go, I can take you and your spirit animal with me, walk the path to the other side. Or..."

Or. Leaving off the useless pulling at his throat he grabbed for that word instead. Or.

His eyes must have told the tale, because she nodded. "Or. Someone is looking for you. Do you want to be found?"

Then he heard it, the despairing scream of a big cat. A very big cat.

"If you want to be found, you'll have to turn around. It'll be painful," she warned him. 

Life is painful, he thought. It always is.

"Yes, it is."

She looked deeply into his eyes and he found himself falling in love with her. 

"Not a good idea," she said, but she actually twinkled while she said it. "You've made your choice, then." When he looked at her, he could feel all the horribly conflicting emotions whirling around in his brain. He wanted to go with her, he wanted to stay, he wanted her to stay, he wanted to be with her, he wanted to be with Jim. "I'll never leave you," she said with a wide, sweet grin. "I'll always be here, whenever you're ready. Because I love you."

Blair Sandburg's heart melted then reformed and began to beat, hard. Fast. He finally got a breath and immediately coughed, spewing nasty fountain water everywhere. His face was cold but his lips were warm and his eyes looked up into an icy blueness that wasn't the sky.

"Jim."


End file.
